When should stop testing?

Once in my training session, I asked “When should stop testing?” One guy proactively told “When the manager told us to stop testing, we should stop”. His answers might look crazy. But, how test managers or test leads arrive a decision to stop testing.

This question comes to every tester. At some point of time there is a necessity to stop testing. Stopping testing helps to measure the progress of the project and to prepare metrics and dashboard which give insight to test managers to take quicker and better decisions.

Following are the situations:

When the acceptance criteria (defined in test strategy) is met

When testers finds more number of defects in very short period of time

When testers are not able to find defects after spending rigorous effort

Traceability between requirements and execution of test cases is looking ideal

Testing is never ending cycle. Testing minimized the chances of failure of any product. Stopping testing is directly aligned with the risks associated in the project. Risks level can be identified by using following

High priority defects count

Test Coverage metrics

Risk based test cases count

Testing Cycles count

Conclusion:

Testing is a continuous process; it is tough to define when you/we should stop testing. It is purely driven by business and the circumstances.